Endoscopes are used, e.g., in order to visually examine body cavities that are not visible from the outside. For this, endoscopes known from the state of the art comprise a shaft and a main unit. An objective lens is provided at a distal end of the shaft, i.e. an end of the shaft facing away from the main unit, and an eyepiece is provided on the main unit. The distal end of the shaft is inserted into the body cavity and the inside of the body cavity is imaged via the objective lens and the eyepiece. In order also to observe the body cavity laterally to a longitudinal axis of the shaft, in known endoscopes it is provided to arrange an optical axis of the objective lens diagonally to the longitudinal axis of the shaft; the optical axis of the objective lens and the longitudinal axis of the shaft therefore form an angle.
In endoscopes it is furthermore known to guide fibre-optic light guides through the shaft, which can be used to illuminate the inside of the body. In order to align the fibre-optic light guides at the distal end of the shaft with respect to the orientation of the objective lens, it is known to insert a wedge at the distal end of the shaft between the fibre-optic light guides and a tube of the shaft during assembly of the endoscope, with the result that the fibre-optic light guides are aligned approximately parallel to the optical axis at the distal end.